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            <name>Title</name>
            <description>A name given to the resource</description>
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                <text>French Execution Ballads</text>
              </elementText>
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  <itemType itemTypeId="33">
    <name>Execution Ballad</name>
    <description/>
    <elementContainer>
      <element elementId="75">
        <name>Set to tune of...</name>
        <description>Melody to which ballad is set.</description>
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          <elementText elementTextId="7010">
            <text>air du Danger</text>
          </elementText>
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      <element elementId="54">
        <name>Language</name>
        <description>Language ballad is printed in</description>
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            <text>French</text>
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        <name>Date</name>
        <description>Date of ballad</description>
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          <elementText elementTextId="7012">
            <text>1755</text>
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        <name>Synopsis</name>
        <description>Account of events that are the subject of the ballad</description>
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            <text>On this date in 1755, Henri Mongeot was broken on the wheel for assassinating the husband of his adulterous lover, Marie.&#13;
&#13;
Louis Alexandre Lescombat was a Paris architect; the betrayal of his flighty wife Marie Catherine Taperet was all the talk of Paris after her lover Mongeot slew the husband whilst out on a walk in December of 1754 — then summoned the watch to present a bogus self-defense claim.&#13;
&#13;
This tactic has been known to work when the killer enjoys sufficient impunity; perhaps a respectable bourgeois like Lescombat could have done it to Mongeot — but when the horny 23-year-old busts up the family home with one blade and then the other, it’s La Mort de Lescombat, a tragedy.&#13;
&#13;
For the widow, one good betrayal would deserve another: Mongeot faithfully avoided implicating her in the murder but when he discovered on the very eve of his death that she was already making time with a new fellow, he summoned the judge and revenged himself by exposing her incitement to the crime. His evidence would doom her to follow him many months later, after the sentence was suspended long enough for the widow Lescombat to deliver a son.&#13;
&#13;
Joining Mongeot on the scaffold this date was a 15-year-old heir to the family executioner business apparently conducting just his second such sentence — Charles-Henri Sanson, the famed bourreau destined in time to cut off the head of the king and queen. Mongeot makes a passing appearance in the 19th century Memoirs of the Sansons; in it, Charles-Henri’s grandson remarks from the family notes that “Mdme. Lescombat … was confronted with him [i.e., her doomed lover] at the foot of the scaffold. She was remarkably handsome, and she tried the effect of her charms on her judges, but without avail.”</text>
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        <name>Method of Punishment</name>
        <description>Method of punishment described in the ballad.</description>
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            <text>hanging</text>
          </elementText>
        </elementTextContainer>
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      <element elementId="62">
        <name>Crime(s)</name>
        <description>Crime or crimes for which the person in the ballad is convicted.</description>
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          <elementText elementTextId="7015">
            <text>murder</text>
          </elementText>
        </elementTextContainer>
      </element>
      <element elementId="65">
        <name>Execution Location</name>
        <description>Location the condemned was executed.</description>
        <elementTextContainer>
          <elementText elementTextId="7016">
            <text>Paris, Place de Greve</text>
          </elementText>
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      <element elementId="5">
        <name>Transcription</name>
        <description>Transcription of ballad lyrics</description>
        <elementTextContainer>
          <elementText elementTextId="7017">
            <text>O Mort, t’es trop cruelle, &#13;
Tu me livres un combat,&#13;
Et quoique je sois belle, &#13;
Faut y sauter le pas;		&#13;
Sans différer,&#13;
Faut perdre la santé,&#13;
Chose assurée,&#13;
Au cabriolet j’irai.&#13;
&#13;
Je partirai sans doute&#13;
Dans quelque jours d’ici:&#13;
Faut que je me résoude&#13;
A ne plus voir Paris;&#13;
C’est aujourd’hui&#13;
Qu’il me faut perdre la vie,&#13;
Sans plus tarder,&#13;
Je me vois condamnée.&#13;
&#13;
Me voilà donc jugée,&#13;
La chose est décidée,&#13;
Et par mon Favori&#13;
J’ai fait tuer mon Mari,&#13;
Qui m’aimoit bien.&#13;
Ah! quel fâcheux destin&#13;
Que j’ai commis,&#13;
Pour plaire à mon ami.&#13;
&#13;
Cela est tout abus,&#13;
Faut que je sois pendue.&#13;
Adieu, Ville de Paris,&#13;
Puisqu’il me faut partir&#13;
En mantelet,&#13;
Ayant un air coquet,&#13;
Tout le monde charmé&#13;
De me voir cabrioler.&#13;
&#13;
Il me faut donc mourir&#13;
Pour vous faire plaisir. &#13;
Adieu, tous mes Amis,&#13;
Et mes Parens aussi.&#13;
Quel grand chagrin,&#13;
Moi qui vous aimois bien,&#13;
Dans votre coeur&#13;
Pour vous quel deshonneur.&#13;
&#13;
Mon Pere, aussi ma Mere,&#13;
Je vous fais mes adieux.&#13;
Quelle douleur amere&#13;
De voir devant vos yeux&#13;
Un tel objet!&#13;
Que vous avez de regret&#13;
De votre enfant &#13;
Que vous aimiez tendrement.&#13;
&#13;
Et le jour de ma mort&#13;
Tout Paris y viendra,&#13;
Les filles, aussi les femmes&#13;
S’empresseront pour cela&#13;
De tous côtés,&#13;
Ils seront étouffés&#13;
Pour contempler&#13;
Ma charmante beauté.&#13;
&#13;
&#13;
Au supplice arrivée;&#13;
A la Ville je monterai,&#13;
Sera pour faire pester&#13;
Ceux que seront charmés,&#13;
Sans plus târder,&#13;
C’est pour m’y voir danser,&#13;
Chose assurée,&#13;
Menuet &amp; Passepied.&#13;
&#13;
Avant de rendre l’ame,&#13;
Son coeur s’en va disant:&#13;
Priez pour moi, mes Dames,&#13;
Que Jesus  tout-puissant, &#13;
Et que pour cette nuit&#13;
Je sois en paradis,&#13;
Je prierai Dieu&#13;
Pour vous dedans les cieux.&#13;
&#13;
Et vous, jeunes fillettes,&#13;
Qui êtes à marier,&#13;
Ne prenez point un homme&#13;
Et sans que vous l’aimiez;&#13;
C’est que je vous le dis,&#13;
J’ai fait tuer mon Mari,&#13;
Ne l’aimant pas,&#13;
Me voilà au trépas.&#13;
&#13;
FIN&#13;
&#13;
Avec Permission&#13;
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        <name>URL</name>
        <description/>
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            <text>https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Catherine_Taperet</text>
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          <name>Title</name>
          <description>A name given to the resource</description>
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            <elementText elementTextId="7009">
              <text>Chanson nouvelle sur Madame Lescombat.&#13;
Sur l’air du Danger.&#13;
</text>
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      <name>Female</name>
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      <name>hanging</name>
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